


Broken Glass and Baseball Bats

by mugsandpugs



Category: IT (2017)
Genre: Canon-Compliant Infidelity, Kissing, M/M, Memory Alteration, OT6, Underage Drinking, angsty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-16
Updated: 2017-09-16
Packaged: 2018-12-27 18:15:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12086628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mugsandpugs/pseuds/mugsandpugs
Summary: Theirs was the most tragic friendship in all the world: to love one another so deeply, to be doomed to continually forget it again and again, as though they'd been nothing to each other at all.





	Broken Glass and Baseball Bats

Growing up in Derry was a strange and dreamlike thing. When, much later, he'd moved away, sold his first manuscript, dated a girl or ten and finally settled down with his beloved Audra, Bill never could quite put his finger on a single concrete memory.

Oh, he had faint hints, _tastes_ of memories. Baseball in the summer and hayrides in the fall; forbidden trecks to the woods and running from bullies with his friends. 

_His friends..._

Oh yes, he had had friends, _wonderful_ friends, though he couldn't for the life of him remember their names or faces. 

This amused Audra to no end. "Such an author; your head is always in the clouds," she teased. _She_ never had trouble recollecting _anything,_ be it from that morning or thirty years prior. 

It didn't bother him, not really. Perhaps it was best childish things remained in childhood, that the door between his two selves- his then and his now- remained firmly shut. 

"Well, I had a great childhood," Audra told him, once or twice. "And I had my little girlfriends and boyfriends. There was Kitty, and Bridgette, and sweet Clint Oliver... We always had a good time together. Running carwashes for spare cash and then spending it all on whatever carnival or circus next came to town." 

"N-n-no c-circuses," Ben surprised them both by speaking up so firmly, and by the unexpected return of his childhood stutter. He took a breath to compose himself, and then said clearly, "We never had a circus. We didn't want them in our town." 

"Why ever not?" she'd laughed, rolling onto her stomach like a cat and tugging playfully at his sleeve. "They're such fun! The lights, and the music, and the food, and the clowns... We loved the clowns!" 

Feeling inexplicably ill, he excused himself for the bathroom, and the conversation, along with so many others, was eventually forgotten with time.

This foggy amnesia remained firmly in place for many years. Twenty-seven years, to be precise. Manuscripts became novels, became full-length series. He toured, and he signed books, and he shook hands with his avid readers. "Your writing is so _visceral,"_ he was commended during interviews. "You really seem to capture the essence of fear. Where does it all come from?!" 

This temporary peace was screeched to a halt by the ringing of his and Audra's landline phone. Bill paused at his typewriter and broke out in a cold sweat, his heart stuttering like a panicked bird in his chest. What was the matter with him?! He got calls all the time! It was probably just his agent, Maurice, calling to ask about his current project and- 

\- But it wasn't Maurice, and he knew it with the certainty of a wayward pirate walking the plank as he stood from his desk and made his slow path into the hallway. The phone rang a third time, a fourth. And though it was just the standard noise of any old telephone, it seemed to him then something sinister: the _oom-pah-pah!_ of a calliope synching to his heart. The smell of cotton candy and peanuts permeated the air as he lifted the heavy plastic phone from its cradle and held it to his ear.

"Hey, B-B-B-Billy-Boy." 

And _oh,_ how fast it all came rushing back. 

Bill sank to the floor, still clutching the phone, and sob-laughed, impossibly relieved. The worst had officially come to pass: he could at last stop waiting for it. 

Because he _knew_ that voice, and _remembered_ the face it was attached to. And though he knew there could be only one reason for the phone call- the faded white scar on his palm ached dully- it was, in that moment, worth anything in the world. 

"Hey, Trashmouth," he greeted Richie Tozier, blinking back tears. "Tell me all about it." 

* * *

His little brother's headstone was clean and simple, unadorned with anything save for a lone balloon his parents had planted there that morning in honor of the occasion: had he lived, Georgie Denbrough would have just turned ten years old. 

He should have been celebrating at the new public swimming pool with cake and ice cream and hoards of screaming, sugar-high preteens shoving badly-wrapped gifts into his freckled hands. 

Instead, he was four years an empty grave as the world around them slowly, gracefully forgot the Derry tragedies of '89. Though he hated it, fought it tooth and nail, Bill suspected he'd forgotten the majority of it, too. It had been a sad time; a scary time. He remembered little more than that. 

The rattle of a stalling engine on the nearby road had him looking up, and a vaguely familiar boy about his age emerged from the drivers' seat of an ancient pickup truck, making an unhurried path his way. It looked like Richie Tozier, newly seventeen, had at last upgraded the two wheels of his bicycle to four. 

Bill knew him from school, though they ran in different crowds. Richie was tall and tan and popular; hated by teachers and adored by classmates for his habitual swearing, slacking, ditching, and smart-ass attitude. Richie seemed to have a new girlfriend every week and still managed to maintain popularity with the guys; they were too admiring to be jealous. 

"Hey, Denbrough!" Richie called now, waving, and broke into a jog. He carried a battered backpack that bounced on his shoulders. So this wasn't some weird mistake, then: he really was coming for Bill. 

"Hey, uh, Richie," Bill greeted awkwardly, wondering what to say to this near-stranger. "What's up?" 

"So this is the weirdest fucking thing, right?" Richie's infamous motor mouth wasted no time, his expressive hands followed along for the ride. "Absolutely fuckiing apeshit. But when I woke up this morning I remembered, hey, it's that Georgie-kid's birthday. And for a second I was thinking maybe I should come over and give him a gift or something, y'know? Pass the torch, or whatever." 

Had Georgie and Richie ever even interacted? This was too surreal. Bill could do nothing but listen. 

"Then I remembered, oh, he's dead, he's six feet under, he bit the dust ages ago. And it was like. An anvil to the chest, man. He's down with the worms; he ain't ever coming back-" 

"Beep-beep, Richie," Bill interrupted miserably, and then both boys froze. Where had _those_ words come from? They had the weight of history they couldn't possibly share, of familiarity and in-jokes and mutual understanding. _He_ knew that _Richie_ knew exactly what the words meant: _You're taking it too far. You're stomping on feelings. You need to crank it down a notch._

Maybe he'd heard someone else say it to Richie at some point in time. What other explanation could there be? 

The teen recovered from his surprise quickly enough and offered an apologetic smile. "The point is, it just really crushed me down, dude. I wondered if you wanted to do anything today? Popcorn was his favorite food, right? Your parents said I'd find you here." 

This was rather a lot of information delivered rapid-fire; Bill could hardly keep up. He blinked, and as he did so, Richie withdrew a paper bag from his backpack and opened it to show fluffy, freshly-popped kernels. 

"Ahh, this is stupid," Richie groused, after only a heartbeat had passed. "It seemed the right thing to do at the time, but now you probably think I'm crazy. And you'd be right." 

"N-no," stuttered Bill, and blushed. He worked so hard to eliminate that stutter, but it was always cropping back up at the most inopportune moments. He cleared his throat. "No, I don't think it's stupid. You're right. Popcorn was his favorite." He laughed a little, looking around. "The n-nicest thing anyone's done for him today, anyway. I _hate_ balloons." 

He hadn't meant to say that last part; it just slipped out. But the way Richie's smile morphed into his lopsided smirk was a bone-deep relief. "Oh thank god," the other boy sighed. "I wasn't gonna say anything, but I hate them, too. Fucking floating things... just. What is even the point? It's awful. It sucks! It-" 

"Georgie wouldn't want it there," Bill said darkly. He didn't know, precisely, how he knew this to be true, but he _did._ The more he thought about it, the more it grated on him: such an obscene thing in what was supposedly a place of rest. 

As though reading his mind, Richie passed him the popcorn and dug the truck keys out of his pocket. Attached to the chain was a pocket knife. He watched Richie flick it open with a thumb and carefully shuffled around the headstone to carve at the ribbon holding it in place. Bill's heart thudded in relief: He wasn't brave enough to do it, so Richie had done it for him, freeing Georgie from a grotesque reminder of... something. 

_Richie had always been his hero._

Always? How long was 'always'? 

"Lets get out of here," Richie suggested, holding the balloon distastefully. He was going to pop it, Bill knew; but not here. Not where the dead could see. "I'll put your bike in the truck?" 

"Yeah," Bill agreed. Somehow, it seemed the right thing to do. "Yeah, I'll be there in a second." 

He waited until Richie was out of earshot before kneeling beside the grave. "I'll come back..." here he hesitated. For the past three years, he'd always said _'next year.'_ He didn't know if that was true anymore. "I'll come back someday," he decided. He didn't know when, but he would keep this promise. 

Richie beeped the truck's horn with two rapid little taps. _Beep-beep._ Now Bill knew he was being teased. Without thinking, he put an arm behind his back, middle finger extended - then froze. He couldn't do stuff like that in a graveyard, not so close to the church! The blasphemy made his face redden, and it wasn't helped by Richie's riotous peals of laughter rising over the grass. 

He scattered a handful of the popcorn beside Georgie's grave and told himself it wasn't littering: birds would be attracted, and the little boy had always loved watching them fly. Then he stomped to the truck and let himself into the passengers' seat, eyeing with satisfaction the popped remains of the balloon thrown onto the dashboard like a vanquished enemy. 

"Where to?" he asked, when Richie started up the engine. 

"Onwards and outwards, B-B-B-Billy-Boy," crowed the other teen. "Forward to better things." 

It was a gorgeous late blue-sky afternoon as they cruised Derry, stopping only for gas and slushies at the Quik Mart. Richie easily charmed the woman behind the counter into selling them a six-pack of beer and a pack of smokes, while Bill watched in puzzled admiration. 

Then they drove to the very edge of town, past the schools and the offices and the churches, right to the 'welcome to Derry' sign. Only then, as they pulled onto the road's shoulder, did Bill see the truth of it all. 

"You aren't coming back," he said slowly. "You're leaving Derry." 

"Ding ding ding; give the boy a prize." Richie climbed from the truck only to lay across the hood, patting the spot beside him in an invitation for company. He pulled a lukewarm beer from its pack, stabbed it with his truck keys, and drank deeply from the side. From where they were parked, they had a clear view of the sun setting. 

"But- but graduation!" Bill protested, scrambling after him. "You can't _go..."_

Richie pulled off the beer can with a satisfied belch after several long gulps, then chucked the can gleefully at the sign. Bill wasn't worried that anyone would see; nobody ever came into or left Derry. "I have to go, Billy. Don't you see? There's nothin' in this town for us. It gets in your head, sucks you down, traps you in place, and then we're just doomed to repeat the same miserable cycle as our folks. Not me. I'm running and I ain't lookin' back. And if you were smart, you'd run too." 

There went his hands again, telling the story alongside his mouth and his wide dark eyes. He had a hooked white scar over the palm of his left hand and, distracted by it, Bill caught Richie's wrist and pinned his fingers flat to study it, then lay his own right hand next to Richie's, comparing. They were such similar scars in such an unusual place... 

"I gave you this scar, didn't I?" Bill asked, and it was like air being let out of a tire; like pressure unleashed. Richie's wide eyes grew impossibly wider, and for a moment it was like a cloud, a _fog_ obscuring their entire lives was being lifted away. "I did it with-" 

_"Broken glass._ You did. And I _let_ you. Why would I..." 

The memories fell like dominoes, spiraling around and around and spelling out the full, ugly picture, until Bill was clutching his chest and staring at Richie, his friend, his _best_ friend, with new eyes. He Saw the years they'd had together, and then the following years that had been stolen from them both. "Oh, Trashmouth." It was all almost too horrible to contemplate. "I _missed_ you. I've been all alone." 

"I-" for once, Richie seemed to struggle for words; expression plain dumbfounded, like Bill had clubbed him over the head. "I... missed... you... too." 

Perhaps, this close to the door out of hell, they'd discovered a tiny window of clarity. It felt fragile and temporary as a soap bubble. To move a step in any direction was to lose sight of the Truth: that the town had them all fenced in like sheep calmly, patiently awaiting their own slaughter. 

Bill was still clutching Richie's hand, and Richie was holding him right back, and for once neither had a smart-mouthed comment to make affirming their masculinity because this was bigger than schoolyard concerns. 

Bill thought, for the first time in _years,_ of Stan and Ben and Eddie and Mike and Beverly, and his heart felt squashed flat with loneliness. He also thought of the true nature of his brother's death, and then tears filled his eyes. It was all too fresh and raw. 

"Aw, hell." Richie never could stand to see his friends in tears. "Don't, c'mon, shh-shh-shh-" 

But it was too late; they were overflowing before he could help himself, and he buried his face in his hands, forgetting that seventeen was too old to let your friends see you cry. 

Richie dragged him close, jostling the remainder of the six-pack so that it fell off the hood with a clatter, and pounded his back, rested his chin on Bill's floppy brown hair. "It's okay, it's okay. I gotcha. I'm here." 

And he was. He was always there when it counted most. Even at Bill's darkest moments, begging for his friends to leave him and save themselves, he'd stayed, and he'd fought for Bill's life. 

"You're the best friend I've ever had, and I'm not even allowed to _remember_ you." 

"I know, buddy, I know." Richie sounded pretty fried himself. "IT just had to go and take everything from us, huh?" 

Bill wept until he was all cried out and more than a bit embarrassed. Richie moved back to allow him to wipe his eyes and streaming nose on his sleeve, his whole face feeling puffy. 

"You're such a crybaby," Richie teased, brushing a stray tear off Bill's face with his knuckle, but there was no real heat behind it. 

"Yeah, and you're still an asshole." 

"You love me." 

_He did._

They rolled apart and stared up at the darkening sky, tracking the sun's path west where it was slowly burning red as it reached the horizon. It'd be chilly soon, and Bill hadn't brought a sweater. The wet spots on his t-shirt cooled as they dried, and he shivered. 

"What are you gonna do, after you leave?" he asked, turning to face his friend again, hungrily trying to burn his face into his memory. (It'd do no good, he knew; within hours, he'd surely forget again.) 

"A cousin of a friend is getting me a job washing dishes." Richie shrugged. "It's not much, but I'll take it over being poisoned another minute here." 

Silence fell again. A lone airplane crossed the sky and disappeared as well. 

"You could come with me," he offered, also rolling onto his side to look at Bill, suddenly energetic with hope. His face was so dear; filled out but not completely grown up, not yet; his eyes forever and always sparking with adventure and just a tad of wickedness. It was easy to see how he'd stolen so many hearts over his brief high school career. 

For a moment, Bill entertained the wild possibility. Washing dishes with Richie. Cramming into some room above a garage with barely enough money left over after rent to pay for instant noodles. Even if they forgot who they were- monster killers; child savers- they'd still be _together._ Away from this horrible, cursed place and all its secrets. It was a wonderful dream. 

And yet- 

"I can't. I have to graduate school. I _have_ to, Richie, before I can run. I'm not-" _I'm not brave like you._ The thought of facing the world outside of Derry without even a diploma as currency was nothing short of terrifying. 

Richie regarded him, looking only a little put out. "I guess I knew you'd say that." 

Bill sighed, a shuddering and not completely dry sound that conveyed that, while the tears had stopped for now, they were still not far from the surface. Then, because they'd forget it soon enough anyway, he moved to lay his head on Richie's chest and felt long fingers comb back his hair. 

"You're lookin' at me like you want me to kiss you," Richie laughed after a second- an awkward chuckle, as though half-teasing again. "Like I'm your boyfriend going off to war or something. Don't worry, baby; I'll come home to you!" He said the last in some dramatic voice, possibly meant to convey a brave soldier about to _do what needed to be done._

"You say that like it's a bad thing." Bill's words were bold enough to make him flush. He remembered that the last person he'd kissed had also left him behind in a town where children were sometimes dragged down into sewers and eaten by monsters. Wouldn't it just be the most pathetic thing ever told if- 

Richie kissed him. 

There was no finesse to it; the angle was all wrong. Nose bumped cheek and stubbled skin aggravated baby-smooth. Bill threaded his fingers through Richie's ever-messy patch of hair and held him close, squeezing him breathless, wanting to bruise his own mouth so that it, at least, might retain some sense memory of his dear friend who showed his love with broken glass and baseball bats. 

They moved- starving for each other; for an ounce of stability in a world that wasn't the same as it had been just hours before. Bill found himself on his back, Richie's hand pressed low to his stomach and his tongue curling in his mouth, and it still wasn't enough, it would never be enough, but it was close. 

This was nothing like Beverly's sweet goodbye kiss. Bill gave as good as he got, dragging his nails down Richie's back to his ass, gripping him and pulling him close. When he growled, Richie laughed a little breathlessly. 

"Damn, Billy-boy." 

"S-s-shut up." He nipped Richie's bottom lip hard enough to swell- maybe he was angry, a little, to be abandoned. And why shouldn't he be?! 

Rather than complaining at the rough treatment Richie just made a _noise_ that had Bill's hair standing on end, and he shivered, relishing in it. _"Fuck."_

They moved together, breathless and messy and burning fast; far too fast. And when they panted, chests warm from proximity, backs cold from night air, Bill thought in that moment that he knew what sound a heart made as it broke. Not because it had happened, but because it and all recollections of it would soon be gone. 

No moment could last forever. 

"I can take you home," Richie offered, but Bill shook his head vehemently. If Richie dared enter that deep into Derry again, it'd catch hold of him, and it would not let him go. There were Things that slept underground; vengeful things that wanted him dead for what he'd done. 

"You need to leave," he said hoarsely, and slid off the hood of the truck, walking around back to pull his bike from between a camper air mattress and a bag full of Richie's clothes and shoes. "Drive safe," he said. He made it two steps away before turning back. 

"Richie, I-" 

The other boy looked at him from where he'd been climbing into the drivers' seat, eyes uncharacteristically serious, and he nodded. "I know, Bill. Me, too. Get out of this town as soon as you can, okay? _Promise_ me you will." 

"I promise." His throat was so closed off that his words were barely a hoarse whisper. His nose and eyes ran when Richie offered him a cheeky salute and started the engine up, and the two boys went in opposite directions, knowing they would not see each other again for a long, long time. 

Bill wiped at his eyes as he walked his bike along the empty roads, passing the graveyard and the storm drains. Derry at night had a peace to it; a stillness. It seemed that nothing bad could ever happen in a place so divorced from time. 

Bill finally reached his home, lit up with warm, butter-yellow light that spilled from the windows and onto the garden. He could hear his mother washing up the dinner dishes inside, and his father half-heartedly watching the news. As he leaned his bike against the garage wall, he paused, touched his cheek, and was shocked to discover that it was wet with tears. 

He couldn't, for the life of him, remember why he'd been crying. 

* * *

Meeting again after two and a half decades apart was a thing of joy and tight embraces all around, despite the stink of fear that consumed them. Joy faded to grief when their party fell one short: Stan had not survived, had traded the promise-scar on his palm for death-scars on both wrists, had bled out alone in a bathtub rather than face the monster again and die by their sides. 

They wept for him, but had precious little time to mourn. The beast had woken; it was their job to silence it, this time forever. They all doubted they'd get a third chance. 

Days were spent acting, planning; and nights... 

Nights they spent in one another's arms. 

"I shouldn't be doing this," Bill said, more than once, between kisses and moans. "I'm married- I'm _happily_ married. I love my wife-" 

They let him say his piece, knowing he'd bowl them over and keep going anyway. 

"Why are we _like_ this?" Eddie sighed, once, from where he'd curled in Richie's embrace. 

"Because we're all whores." Richie grinned devilishly. 

Bev glared at him, snuggled comfortably between Ben and Mike. "It's because we love too much," she argued, sounding at once defiant and exhausted. 

"Isn't that what I just said?" 

Bill thought it was simply because they were all too damned to stop now, but he kept that to himself. Theirs was the most tragic friendship in all the world: to love one another so deeply, to be doomed to continually forget it again and again, as though they'd been nothing to each other at all.

Richie accompanied Bill to visit Georgie's grave for the last time, keeping his promise of long ago. Together they cleared away the weeds, wiped the dirt with damp cloths, and said their goodbyes. Georgie would have been thirty-three now. He might have married. He could have been a father. He could have been _anything,_ but Bill would only ever see him as a sailor: Captain Georgie, chasing a little paper boat all the way out of the world and into a nightmare that never ceased. 

None of the Losers had become parents. They knew all-too-well what the things that went bump in the night could do to children. 

_I'll be with you soon, Georgie,_ Bill thought. _We all will._

He saw no possible alternative: luck and childhood faith had saved them once- there was no way it could do so again. They'd fight to their last breaths, and could only hope it'd be enough to bring about an end. 

The final day dawned bright and early. Derry was as picturesquely beautiful as ever: the summer sun high in the sky, not a cloud in sight. The frequent rainfall ensured everything stayed lush and green, and the tiny, charming houses and timeless old storefronts looked like something off a postcard. 

It was as good a day to die as any. 

Bill stood in the center of his friends, Bev's hand in his left and Richie's in his right. Scar-to-scar they approached the rotted and faded Neibolt house, which was haunted by more than just ghosts. It was time.


End file.
